Meet Melia Hord, a mother of two young boys who, like most working Americans, found herself frustrated trying to create work-life balance.

“I struggled for many years balancing work life demands and hours with the “daycare shuffle” and actively participating in their [her two boys] upbringing,” Hord explained during an interview with Recruiter.com. “I tormented myself with my inability to put my family over the corporate needs/priorities of my job. I could not find a happy medium between the corporate hours and a happy home.”

How many women can relate to Hord’s situation?

Instead of settling for her current scenario, Hord took her destiny, happiness and future success into her own hands. She joined Lulu Avenue, a direct-sales jewelry e-commerce launched in 2013, and combined her passion for jewelry with her desire for personal, professional and financial independence to create an unconventional recipe for career success.

Recruiter.com had the opportunity to chat with the founding senior leader of Lulu Avenue’s Style Advisor Program. Read on to discover what Hord had to say about how the company is helping many other women like her become “Mompreneurs,” and trade-in the traditional 9-5s for entrepreneurship and success.

1. How is Lulu Avenue helping “Mompreneurs” escape the traditional 9-5 working environment?

Lulu Avenue offers a simple and flexible business model enabling women [and men] to earn full-time pay by working on their individual time schedule. Women want the “success, worth and recognition” of holding down a job that pays an income, but long for the “wholeness” of being an active and engaged parent that raises her own children.

The Lulu Avenue business model empowers its style advisors to succeed personally and professionally by allowing them to work their business around their family life. By providing 24/7 in-depth training, an affordable designer branded jewelry line and fine Moissanite pieces, and the very latest technologies available, a “mompreneur” can leverage her time and talents and broaden the opportunity to reach those beyond her personal and physical borders so she can work her direct sales business anywhere and anytime.

2. Lulu Avenue offers its team members unique tools, such as a personalized website, custom newsletter and private internal social network. How do these tools benefit your style advisors?

The company offers every Style Advisor:

A replicated personalized website for ecommerce and e-boutique business;

Administrative back office to their website for 24/7 training;

Customer database;

Real-time sales and activity reports;

Computer generated evite systems;

Custom newsletters and warm call reports; and

A private internal social network linking you to fellow business partners in every state.

This enables every Style Advisor the ability to leverage her time and talents while broadening the opportunities to reach customers, prospects and business opportunities beyond the limitations of physical borders.

3. Why do you think unconventional work roles (freelance, contract, virtual/work-from-home, etc.) have become so popular over the past few years?

Unconventional work roles have become ever so popular as the advancements in technology enable our society to work smarter, more efficiently, and remotely. In today’s world of economic insecurity, corporate restructurings, job insecurity and the desire to “have it all,” people are looking for the opportunities that allow them to control their life – both personally and professionally.

Thanks to technology, there are a vast amount of opportunities to work from home. Whether it’s to supplement or contract to traditional businesses to accommodate their budget and staff limitations; market and sell products to businesses in different time zones; or run a successful business out of your home (with staff or team members in other states), technology is enabling the impossible to be possible in business! The traditional work day is no longer governed by 9 to 5 hours but rather by the speed and accessibility to the internet.

4. What advice would you offer those in traditional jobs who desire to transition into more independent working environments and roles?

My advice is “take the risk in yourself” because quite honestly “YOU are your BEST RISK.” As a former CPA, division controller and owner of a retail gift shop, I understand that we often lose ourselves in our high-power careers striving to accomplish “someone else’s” dreams.

I got comfortable and dependent on receiving a set paycheck and company benefits to the point that I could no longer see a way “out” of my job to pursue my passion or dreams. And when I calculated my hourly pay to my actual paycheck, the grim reality was that I often times made less than minimum wage.

I traded my dreams for a check; I traded the happiness of my family for someone else’s’ priorities.

Never forget that the belief in you is more powerful than the belief in someone else’s mission. You are worth more; you are your best risk. And if you take a risk in YOU, you can achieve anything you set your mind out to do!

5. Final words of wisdom?

I tell everyone I meet that the rewards are great, or the rewards are small in this business. Only you can determine how far, or how long, you reap them.

Just always remember there are options out there in life to make your life better, more complete and in line with your dreams. The choice is yours.

I am a firm believer that life is short. Don’t take most of the time you have sitting on the fence deciding what choice to make. You can always make another choice if the one before wasn’t the right one!

Marks’ stories have also been published in a variety of newspaper, magazine and online formats including The Arizona Republic, The Daily Herald, Arizona Foothills Magazine and various classroom magazines of Scholastic Inc. Service is her passion, writing is her platform and uplifting and inspiring the community is her purpose. Marks received a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism and Mass Communication from Arizona State University. Google+ Profile